Took out the DeLorean for the first time...

[dn010]

No, its only on the outside. Just smells like coolant when you walk around it. No visible leaks and it doesn't use any coolant.

I am confused. I thought you said it was leaking coolant by the manifold?

[David T]

No, its only on the outside. Just smells like coolant when you walk around it. No visible leaks and it doesn't use any coolant.

You may have large leaks under the intake manifold and you will not see them. The top of the motor has pockets that can hold a lot and it will boil so you never see it on the ground. If you have to continually add coolant then you have leaks. If you smell coolant you have leaks. The header tank should be 1/2 full when cold. If you overfill it you will dump the excess when the motor gets hot out the overflow. If you add you MUST use 50/50 soft water and anti-freeze unless you buy the pre-mixed stuff with water already added.

[davidc89]

I am confused. I thought you said it was leaking coolant by the manifold?

I do, but only when it sits in cold weather for an extended period of time. Its not large but it does leave some on the exhaust. When you start it up for the first time after it gas sat, the coolant burns off that was on the exhaust. It doesn't leak after that or when its warmer than freezing outside

[dn010]

Maybe you've got some coolant seeping from one of the expansion plugs in the head behind the exhaust manifold. I've seen some of them get pretty rusty...

[davidc89]

You may have large leaks under the intake manifold and you will not see them. The top of the motor has pockets that can hold a lot and it will boil so you never see it on the ground. If you have to continually add coolant then you have leaks. If you smell coolant you have leaks. The header tank should be 1/2 full when cold. If you overfill it you will dump the excess when the motor gets hot out the overflow. If you add you MUST use 50/50 soft water and anti-freeze unless you buy the pre-mixed stuff with water already added.

Right, but I am not having to add coolant. Just kind of figured that's how it was. It doesn't smoke or anything. Only by the manifold after it has sat awhile in cold temperatures like previously mentioned.

[dn010]

Any leak, even the smallest, well get worse over time.

Speaking of expansion plugs, when I had my '67 Mustang, one of the expansion plugs had a small pin hole leak between the plug and the block. I didn't fix it and one day the whole plug blew out, the car looked like it was on fire with all the coolant blowing out all over the exhaust, I was also stranded (it was the days before cell phones were a normal thing)...

You know you have a leak, you can see you've got one somewhere and you can smell it burning when you run. Better to track down any leaks and fix them now before it causes more serious problems. If this minor leak turns major you might not know because the engine is behind you unless you happen to notice the temp gauge pegged and if you don't notice that, new engine time.

[DMCMW Dave]

A good test to see if the coolant leak is in the valley vs a water pump leak is to simply jack up the front end of the car. If the valley is full of coolant from a leak under the intake, it will run out somewhat dramatically. If the leak is the water pump nothing will happen.

[rdarlington]

DMCH sells the Workshop Manual in a nice. big binder. Part number there is P3113096.

Yeah, but they couldn't be bothered to buy a ream of drilled paper when they printed mine. $50 and I got to punch the holes. It's still better than any scan of the old manual you can find on the net.

-Bob

[DMCMW Dave]

Yeah, but they couldn't be bothered to buy a ream of drilled paper when they printed mine. $50 and I got to punch the holes. It's still better than any scan of the old manual you can find on the net.

-Bob

When did that happen? All the copies I have are in 3-ring binders and I've never seen anything else.

[rdarlington]

When did that happen? All the copies I have are in 3-ring binders and I've never seen anything else.

Order Number 114844
Customer ID 156099
Order Date 8/28/2013 2:29:14 PM

It was a nice 3 ring binder, and a shrink wrapped stack of pages that I had to punch to get into the binder. Talked to Sarah about it and she said:

"Would you like a different workshop manual? If so, let me know and we can include it with your order going out today."

I'm not sure how another one would be any different so I declined. It was extremely annoying but not a show stopper. I'd be interested in knowing if they're still doing that, although I'm probably never going to be in the market for another workshop manual (but ya never know)

-Bob